Hoa Hakananai'a

Description

Part of the British Museum's Objects in Focus range, an introductory guide to Hoa Hakananai'a. Hoa Hakananai'a, or "stolen/hidden friend', was discovered at the impressive ceremonial village of Orongo, Rapa Nui (Easter Island), Polynesia in 1868. It is not known precisely when this basalt figure was carved, but by 1000-1100 AD, similar-sized statues, all called Moai, were being quarried in the volcanic ash of Rano Raraku. Nearly a thousand moai were produced - all sacred icons exemplifying the Polynesian concern with ancestry, the gods, life and death. This book tells the story of Hoa Hakananai'a: an imposing, intriguing figure of superb workmanship, it was the focal point of initiation rites, and is layered with late relief carvings that relate it to exotic birdman rites.

Jo Anne Van Tilburg is an archaeologist and the director of the Easter Island Statue Project. A Research Associate of the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology, University of California, she has conducted an inventory of 887 monolithic statues on Rapa Nui and in museum collections. She is the author of Easter Island: Archaeology, Ecology and Culture (1994) and Among Stone Giants: The life of Katherine Routledge and her remarkable expedition to Easter Island (2003).